Listening to an album as a whole

Having listened to metal for several years now, I got into classical about a year ago (Respighi rules)... and am now noticing something I hadn't before: Rather than picking out favorite tracks, some metal albums are best listened to as a whole.

In the past, I had favorite tracks, but now... it seems best to turn off the lights, sit down on the floor, and let the whole album play as if it were one epic mind journey of a track. Have any of you experienced this? If so, what are good examples of albums like this?

This is a pretty pervasive idea 'round these here parts. I'm pretty sure everyone agrees with this, and I know things like this have been discussed in the past. Any good album should be listened to as a whole. In terms of listening to music in the dark, I'd suggest anything by Burzum or Beherit. Hvis Lyset Tar Oss and Electric Doom Synthesis being the best.

Having listened to metal for several years now, I got into classical about a year ago (Respighi rules)... and am now noticing something I hadn't before: Rather than picking out favorite tracks, some metal albums are best listened to as a whole.

In the past, I had favorite tracks, but now... it seems best to turn off the lights, sit down on the floor, and let the whole album play as if it were one epic mind journey of a track. Have any of you experienced this? If so, what are good examples of albums like this?

Select hit singles strikes me as commercial. If a group records a great single and sticks it in a full length then what are the other six tracks? Filler? That reminds me of food. The toy prize was very creative but the rest of it was a Happy Meal of a paper box, chicken gristle, and soggy fries.

Ipods have lead to a regression to the mean... in the 50s-60s music came out in singles and albums were merely a collection of singles or a few singles with a bunch of filler. The Beatles, Bob Dylan, the Who and others all started to change this in the late 60's by making entire albums to be listened to as a piece. Granted, Sgt. Pepper and Tommy were both confused failures, they were at least trying to overcome the limits of the music industry.Long before I got into metal I was concerned about getting ALBUMS to which I could listen. Poorly organized wrecks like Tommy and Blizzard Beasts still disgust me and I cannot understand why you'd want to listen to Det Som Engang Var and not keep going through to the last note of Tomhet.I still have numerous singles on my computer (hey, sometimes one just needs to hear Manic Monday, haha), but I will only buy complete albums. If a group tries to sell me shit, I will pay for it exactly what it is worth: nothing. Thank Odin for torrents.Immolation - Close to a World Below, Here in After, Failures for Gods are all albums which I can listen to only as a complete album (although I will listen to "I Feel Nothing" by itself while getting ready for work).Darkthrone - Transylvanian Hunger... quite possibly the best black metal album. So beautiful.Graveland - Following the Voice of BloodMy Bloody Valentine - LovelessThe Who - The Who Sell Out. one of the most innovative albums of the 60's - recorded and released concurrently with Sgt. Peppers. A much better concept for an album than Tommy or the failed 'Lifehouse project' of later Who years. The album's concept is an hour long broadcast from a pirate radio station complete with commercials. Like Tommy the concept is linked together by too many shitty songs, but they are of overall better quality and there is far less evident confusion on this album. Not a great album, but at least it had a good concept unlike Tommy or Sgt. Pepper(what was the concept there? Some of the worst Beatles songs written. The whole thing is tarted up with glossy production to distract one from the obvious conclusion that this album generally sucks. A precursor of modern pop - all production very little writing.)

I've found that listening to albums as a whole (the entire thing, no shuffle) is something I really do more for black metal and not death metal.

Death metal listening for me might go something like: listen to a couple tracks off 'Suffocation - Pierced from within', then a couple of tracks off 'Immolation - Here in After' and then 'Immolation - Close to a world below' and then the Timeghoul demos and so on.

Even with black metal it depends: stuff like Antaeus and Drakthrone gets thrown into the above mix, while 'Emperor - ITNE', 'Avzhia - Key of Throne' and Graveland 'Thousand Swords' I *only* listen to when I know I have time to listen to the entire thing from start to end, uninterrupted.

This is how I generally like to function when listening to metal. I don't like picking and choosing tracks like "singles" or "commercials", but everyone has their favorite songs. Most of the time I try to get through an album in its entirety, and it's no problem when it's an album I absolutely love (for instance I've played Anticapital so many times I don't even need to listen to it; I can pretty much play the whole thing in my head).

I've got this mainly with Burzum and Emperor, and I occasionally get a shock when I absolutely anticipate every note of every solo of some Power Metal album which I haven't listened to for five years but which used to be a daily listen.

I almost only listen to albums and often I won't listen to anything at all if I can't squeeze the entire thing in. Once an album has revealed itself to the point I have to skip even a few tracks I usually stop listening to it all together.

I don't even consider listening to music any other way, to be honest. This has made me all the more disinterested in most forms of music, as the majority of it is produced on a song-by-song basis - which makes listening to an entire album's worth of jazz/rock/pop/etc. songs extremely disheartening. And drab.